


Obey

by RyMagnatar



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Adultery, Cheating, Infidelity, M/M, Post SBURB, mentions of blackrom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-25
Updated: 2012-10-25
Packaged: 2017-11-17 01:22:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,411
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/545967
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RyMagnatar/pseuds/RyMagnatar
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You are living with and dating Dirk Strider. Some have advised you against it, because they can see how hung up he is on English still. You're not blind, you see it too. Despite that not quite quenched flame Dirk has, you stay. </p><p>After all, you know exactly how to keep him yours.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Obey

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ribbonelle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ribbonelle/gifts).



> Happy Birthday darling uwu

You’re rolling your hips, moving this way so your bulge -coiled and curled as it was- moved inside of him the way he liked. You’re bent over him, your forehead nearly pressed against the back of his neck and one of your hands holding tightly to his hips. Your breathing raggedly, and it’s tearing its way out of your throat with each flex of your muscles. The moment your bulge presses against his prostate, he clenches around you. There’s a brief smile, jagged and unfamiliar on your face, at the sound he makes as you press in harder but it shatters into pieces the moment his moan becomes a coherent phrase.

“Jake—”

The word falls from his lips like venom from a fang. It takes all the control you have over yourself to keep from recoiling, yanking yourself out of him in a way that would only end up hurting you. It takes more control than you have to keep from digging your claws into his flesh and it’s his pained groan that brings your attention to the new blood on his hips. You lift your head and close your eyes and you rock your hips against him. You can already feel the leaden weight pooling in your stomach, feel the way that it has begun seeping through your veins.

Dirk’s hips buck up from the mattress, moving faster and faster. You recognize his breathing, his heartbeat, even the amount of sweat he’s giving off at this point. You know his body better than you know your own. When he begins to clench his teeth, you let your eyes flutter open and watch the side of his face. He cums like its painful for him, his body shuddering and the cry he makes like that time he broke his leg and stared at you, looking up from the concrete with wide white eyes and burning orange irises and-

He settles, though, settles into the mattress with his skin glistening and his chest shivering with each of his gasping breaths. He’s coming off his hormonal, chemical high, and shifts his hips against you. That little displeased grunt is all you need to hear before you’re pulling yourself out of him. For a moment, you hover over him, held up on hands and knees, and you look at him, on his stomach below you, a slither of purple sliding up his crack to his lower back.

You sigh softly and inch downwards. You lick the purple trail from his spine and lap at the blood on his hips. It’s metallic and warm, so different than your own salty, cool blood. You suck at the pricks where your claws dug into his flesh and you toy with the thought of biting hard into him, scarring him, marking him as yours.

It’s like he knows you’re thinking because he reaches down and grabs you by the horn. He hauls your head up without a word. You grunt and he slides his palm down to the base and digs his nails into the bed of your horn. Tears spring to your eyes. You stare up at him as he stares down at you. He keeps digging in his nails until those gathered tears have begun to run down your cheeks.  Only then does he let you go and flop over onto his back.

You continue to lick at his skin, adoring the salt of his sweat and the odd taste of his cum. When you’ve made your way up to his neck, he’s half awake, one hand absently petting at your black hair and the other pillowed behind his head. He lets you press a kiss to the corner of his mouth, even half kisses you back. On your side, facing him, you watch him fall asleep.

You fall asleep watching him breathe but when you sleep, you do not dream.

* * *

In the human world, you thought six months was a lot of time. Rose has told you over and over, that the person you meet in spring could be a totally different person by fall and that change was most prominent when you were away all that time. Back before it was as serious with Dirk as it has become, when you still had your own place and Dirk called you fuckbuddy and not boyfriend, Rose would tuck your hair behind your ear and hum as she cradled your face in her soft palms and she would tell you all about human psyche. You listened to her, even though it seemed like such a weak science, because her words were a river of soothing waters and learning about all the twisted avenues of the human mind made you feel less horrified over your own behavior.

It’s because of Rose you gave him time, more than six months by now. It’s because of Rose that you thought you could figure out what he needed and give it to him. It’s because of Rose that you thought yourself strong enough to handle the heart of a man who refused to believe he had one.

Funny, you thought with a humorless smile, it was because of Dirk that you didn’t have Rose anymore.

Yet she was right, wasn’t she?

You look up from the book you’re pretending to read, lounging on a torn armchair, and watch Dirk’s shoulders move as he fiddles with the bits of his latest project. Six months after you met him, he went from blowing you off without a word to worming his way into your nook in back alleys and the backseats of cars. Six months after that, you finally graduated to being brought home and getting breakfast the morning after. Six months after the house was opened to you, he started poking into your life, asking who your friends are, showing up where you worked ‘just to say hi’, all the while carefully describing you as a friend with benefits.

Six months after that, he tried to shove you away. You remember sobbing in confusion after a night where he was so cold to you it was like the beginning again. Fuck humans, you were done with them. Then Rose had glided in, explained and explained and explained and even though you were still confused- still didn’t understand why he had to test you like this- you already knew then it was too late for you. You were hooked onto him and couldn’t give him up. So you stuck it out, six months he pushed you farther and farther, but you clawed your way back into his life each time.

You endured and after six months, you got the fucking truth from him, finally.

He took you out to a little café. It was one of those hole in the wall places that you never would have seen and knew he wouldn’t really care about, even for irony’s sake. He bought you a drink and sat with you out on a metal chair, arms folded tight over his chest. You waited for him to talk, enjoying the tea, but the sound of construction from across the street not so much.

Then, with his chin, he pointed across the street and said, “The guy in the khakis, green shirt, dark hair. Looks like he could bench press a horse?”

You looked and there he was. A big guy, probably as tall as you were and as broad as Equius. Sure, he was kind of attractive but you had a type and he didn’t fit it. While you watched, Dirk said, “I love him.”

Six months after he told you that, you moved into his apartment.

And now you sit here, three years after you met him, watching him while pretending to read your book and thinking about the man that he said he loved. You still haven’t met him. Dirk never takes you anywhere where your paths could cross and if he goes out to see him at all, well, he doesn’t exactly tell you that, now does he?

“You’re doing that thing again,” he says, not turning around.

“What thing?” You wonder if they’ve ever kissed. Dirk doesn’t talk about it. No one talks about it. It’s like that incident between John and Jane. No one says shit about it, but everyone knows better than to let them drink together again.  This is different, though. This goes farther back than you know, and it’s contained in the older siblings.

(Rose just shrugged her slender shoulders when you asked about the history between Dirk and Jake. “All I know is that it wouldn’t work out,” she’d said, “There’s a personality problem between the two of them, or bad blood, or mistrust. All I know is that they don’t talk anymore, and that’s it. Believe me I’ve done all I could to get Roxy to explain it. No luck.”)

“That thing where you stare at me like you’re deciding which cut is choicest for dinner tonight,” Dirk’s voice cuts into your thoughts about Rose with ease. You’re a little grateful for that too, even though that makes you feel guilty. You should have fought more to keep her than you had.

“I’m thinkin’ ribs sound good tonight,” you like the way humans prepare their meat. They really enjoy their food in a way Alternians are just learning. Food was a necessity back home, not a pleasure. “We have any in the fridge?”

“Freezer,” he said, “Part of that cow we ordered a while back.” The rolls his shoulders back. You hear his spine pop as he straightens it. “Go get it out to thaw. And stop staring at me when I work.”

You flip your book shut and get up. You step up behind him, place a hand on the center of his back and lean in. You kiss behind his ear and then say, “One order at a time, darlin’.”

He glances at you from the corner of his eye, a glimmer of orange behind black reflective shades. He says nothing, just waves you off and settles back in to his work. You consider forcing him to look to you. Thoughts of Jake have you on edge. In the end, though, you give in to his desires and go get the ribs out to thaw for dinner.

* * *

The setting sun heralds the time for work. After dinner is consumed and cleaned up, you pick up your shoulder bag and head out with, tonight, a quick goodbye. Dirk’s terse farewell is a marker for his annoyance at you, whether it was because you were staring or because you were snarky, you aren’t perfectly sure. All you know is that he’s more than a little annoyed at you and work is going to be a reprieve, once more.

Down at the lab, the night is uneventful. You’re between studies at the moment, catching up straggling data from your last experiment and refining everything down into its proper charts. Midnight comes and goes and the early night hours, the ones that you once spent drinking at a bar or struggling to get just a few hours of sleep before class, you now spend pouring over strings of data and spreadsheets. Tonight, there’s only one other soul in the lab, some wisp of a girl who keeps to herself on the other side, and you sorely miss Jade’s company.

Longing for her, though, is about as useful as longing for Rose again. Jade has long since transferred out to the open ocean to study and Rose has, well, dropped off your radar, so to speak.

You finish early, working without distraction can do that sometimes, and you’re ready to head out before the sky has even considered lightening.

It’s the darkest of the dark hours and you have to turn up the collar of your coat against the night chill. The bus doesn’t come around for another couple of hours, but you decide a walk home would be good for you. The city’s air is heavy; once, back when you first moved here, you could feel the pollutants tingling along the membrane edges of your gills. These days, you keep a patch over the slits, to keep them clean, and use long baths to wash them out from time to time.

By the time you have the apartment building within sight, a light sweat has begun to form down your spine and your legs are burning from exertion. It’s been nearly an hour, a long walk for a short bus ride, but you don’t regret it. You look up the dark shadow of the building, easily locating the one that belongs to you and Dirk. The window is almost always lit, right there at the very top. A light smile crosses your features.

A shadow passes over the window. Your heart clenches oddly in your chest. It’s too broad to be Dirk.

The pain of your legs is forgotten as you race that final half a block to your apartment building. You take the stairs two at a time until you reach halfway, where you stop, gasping for breath. The rest of the trip up you take in the elevator, breath painful, heart a thundering in your chest, and your fingers clutching to the strap of your bag so tightly your claws have caught in the fabric.

At the top, you stagger out of the elevator and go straight to your apartment door. It swings open under your touch. Your first thought is of fear. Dirk never leaves the door unlocked. Dirk never lets strangers into the place. Dirk never—

\--would leave shoes too big for him to wear by the front door.

Your first thought had been a possible break in. Dirk’s robotic shit was pricey, and plus there were collectables he had that could fetch a good price as well. But now—

Now you’re looking at these well-worn, steel-toed boots, and you think you might be sick.

Three steps further into your, well, _Dirk’s_ , apartment and you don’t think a burglar would make those kinds of noises. You close the door behind you softly and peel of your own shoes. Your movements are mechanical, all automatic, as you put your bag in its place, your coat on its hook and you go to the kitchen. You stare into the fridge, unable to think of what you were looking for. You end up getting a glass of tepid water and going to the living room.

The sound is louder here, so clearly not Dirk and not at all some recording, but there’s nowhere else you can go. You sink down onto the couch. You stare at the glass in your hand. The water ripples with the shaking of your hands. You think you could go to the roof but—No. You’d rather not push your luck tonight.

You swallow a few gulps of water to help push back the bile, and dig out your phone. You stare at it. This is when you need a moirail, right? When your matesprit, if you and Dirk even really _were_ matesprits, took another to bed. When you teetered on the edge of sanity, barely able to make yourself breathe, let alone function; this was when you needed a moirail to shoosh and pap you into calmness.

Eventually, the noise dies down. There’s the muffled sound of voices, this time  you can tell Dirk is talking as well. Then comes a shout, the raised voice of who you can only assume is the Jake  you’ve only seen the once, “Dirk, you can’t just keep doing this to me!”

Dirk’s low reply must have come next, though you strained to hear it and failed to do so.

“I’m being bloody unfair? Don’t you dare- My God have you no shame?”

Laughter. Dirk’s. This you can hear better, he’s louder with it. Louder means worse when it comes to his laughter. He’s mocking with this tone. Your grip tightens on the glass.

“I don’t know why I keep falling for this, keep listening to you when—”

His words are cut short. You suck in a sharp breath. Your claws scratch the glass.

“Dirk—”

The word is a moan.

The glass shatters in your hand. “ _Fuck!”_ You shout.

Purple blood and water runs down your arm, drips onto the couch. Your hand trembles, glass shards fall and everything becomes blurry. Your glasses have slid down your nose and tears have filled your eyes. “Fuck,” you whisper softly, covering your mouth with your hand.

The door opens with a bang behind you. You jump purely at the crack of noise. Yet you don’t move from where you sit on the couch.

You hear that unfamiliar voice stringing together words, but your mind can’t focus on that. You’re trying to hard not to cry. You’re a grown damn troll and Dirk’s already won plenty of tears from you. You try to bolster yourself against him, try to harden your heart, but the couch is sinking to your right and there’s the pale blurred shape of Dirk beside you.

He doesn’t insult you, like many others could, or would, he just takes your hand firmly in his own and you see the glimmer of metal. Dirk plucks each piece of glass from your flesh with the skill of the deft-handed, and puts them on the coffee table. “Come on,” the first words he speaks to you are soft, they’re nearly in your ear. “We’re going to wash this out.”

Your legs ache along with the rest of your body as he pulls you up and takes you to the kitchen sink. The blur of the world has eased, but you’re afraid that’s because you’ve given in and have begun to cry. He washes out your cuts and gets a kitchen towel to wrap your hand in. He pushes you down into a chair and says, “Stay.”

You can do nothing but obey.

Head bowed, hand wrapped in a slowly purpling towel, you struggle to regain control of your breath. There is noise, sounds behind you. Voices and shuffling clothing. Whispering.

“This is low, even for you, fucking hell Dirk.”

“Just shut up and get the hell out.”

“I cannot believe that I… You know what, I’ll gladly leave. And consider us on very bad terms.”

“We’ll see how long you can make that last mister gentleman.” Dirk’s snark is somewhat reassuring to you. You would not be able to stand it if he were tender to this stranger. The pain of your legs is subsiding, but that only makes your hand ache more.

“We are done. We are absolutely done. What kind of person does this to their boyfriend or matesprit or whatever you two are? This is awful. You’re awful.”

“Now you’re just saying that to hurt my feelings, baby, because you were having such a good time.” You hear the venom in Dirk’s voice, that dip that means he was actually taking the insult to heart. You wonder if this Jake can hear it too.

There’s a slap of flesh on flesh. At first you think it might be Dirk smacking Jake’s arm or back, but that doesn’t sound right. You turn around and instead of two verbally sparing men, you see Jake’s fist inches from Dirk’s face. Dirk’s holding it back, though, with his muscles rippling in his arms. Jake’s fully dressed, his shirt inside out though, and Dirk’s only in a pair of low slung pants. Low enough on his hips you can tell he’s not wearing underwear, but that was typical of him. There’s a handful of light bruises on his sides in the shape of fingermarks. Like four lonesome soldiers, though, your clawmarks from a few nights ago stand out dark red and scabbed amongst the purpling flesh.

Jake’s face is a stormcloud and Dirk’s is a glacier. But they both are staring each other with nothing but violence in their postures.

You stand. The chair’s legs screech along the tile floor and draws their attention. They watch you as you stalk over. You grab both of their wrists and forcibly pull them apart. Jake struggles against your grip, but Dirk resists harder. He hates it when you use your inhuman strength against him. Jake gives in, though, and his arm goes limp. You get a good look at him now, tousled hair, swollen lips and broad shoulders. All the brute strength that Dirk liked and just enough submissiveness to make him dependent; no wonder Dirk still loved this man.

You turn your gaze to Dirk. He’s looking at your hand. Purple blood drips down his arm. He says nothing to you, but that’s what you expect.

You let go of Jake, but keep a hold of Dirk. “I’d like it a whole fuckin’ lot if you decided now was about the right time to be headin’ home, Jake.” You don’t smile. You can barely keep yourself from screaming the words. At his hesitation, you bare your teeth at him. Any sense of guilt he may feel or stupid protectiveness he had didn’t cover up the flinch he gave you at your sharp teeth.

He nods and turns, slipping on his shoes and walking out without another word.

It’s only then that you lessen your grip on Dirk’s arm. He instantly twists his arm out of your hold and grabs you by the front of your shirt. He grips it tightly, pulling you close and hisses, “What the fuck was that about?”

“I don’t know why you ever picked me over him,” you reply. “He’s everythin’ you want, isn’t he?”

Dirk recoils like you threw boiling oil at him. Disgust contorts his features for a moment, followed briefly by agony and pain and then sweeping sorrow until he regains his composure again. Your shoulders slump. That’s really all the answer that you need from him.

Holding out your tattered hand you ask, “Would you please stitch me up?”

Dirk meets your gaze. You wonder why you haven’t noticed he was without his glasses this whole time. His eyes are burning orange like the rising sun, and his mouth opens slightly like he can’t believe what you’re saying. “Why are you—” His mouth snaps shut. You wait.

He reaches out his hands. They’re shaking worse than yours were. “Come on.”  His voice is soft, a feather light touch that’s barely even there. “Sit down and I’ll take care of you.”

With a smile that you hope doesn’t show the desperate need you have for him to always say those words to you, you nod and obey.

* * *

You’re lying on your back, the pillow cushioning your head, and your arms folded underneath them. Weak sunlight is streaming through the window by now, giving the room a grey light that will, in time, become warm and honey gold. You stare up at your ceiling, unable to settle your mind enough to sleep.

He, Eridan, lays beside you. His forehead is tucked against your jaw and he has his wounded hand stretched over your bare chest. His cool breath runs over your neck, and sometimes, when he shifts, you feel the hard nudge of a horn against your cheek. You would say he’s asleep, but the way his fingers draw slow circles over your sternum suggest otherwise.

He’s had his sopor patch on for a couple of hours now, though, so he’s drowsy-drunk on that. He should be asleep. You were waiting for him to fall asleep so you could get up and shower again or get your hands busy on a robot or _something,_ anything to take the edge off now. But he hasn’t fallen asleep.

And you haven’t fallen asleep.

“You should hate me,” the words are out of your mouth and you would stop them from continuing but his hand stills, instantly telling you that you’ve caught his attention. That flips a switch in your brain, a trigger, a swelling of power that you have never tried to stifle, never even thought to. “You should hate me and be threatening me that you’re going to walk out. You should be screaming at me about how I betrayed you. You should be furious.”

His breathing is deep and even. Slow, like he’s falling asleep, but his head moves against your neck and you feel his cheek move like he’s smiling, or scowling. “I am,” he finally says. You feel his words more than hear them, a thrum that moves into your chest. “Absolutely furious. I broke one of my favorite glasses and cut up my hand. Typing is goin’ to be a fuckin’ bitch.”

There’s a twitch of a frown that crosses your lips and you let it because he can’t see you. You’ve shown him enough emotion tonight. “That’s not what I meant. We’ve seen how this works in others. Relationships don’t withstand this kind of betrayal. You should hate me, Eridan, not snuggle up to me like I’m your favorite damn stuffed bear.”

“And where are you getting’ this information?” He tightens his arm around your chest . “You’ve been watchin’ romcoms haven’t you. Dammit Dirk you know those are shit, especially the interspecies relationship ones. Everyone knows that humans get a moirailship.”

He’s deliberately dancing around the topic. Anger surges through your veins. You pull a hand from behind your head and grab a fistful of his hair. He grunts as you pull his head back. You twist around so you can look at him, “You know exactly what I’m fucking talking about. This isn’t about romcoms. This is about me fucking Jake right here in this bed and you being completely okay with it!”

With one of those sad little smiles, an expression that should be a smirk if his eyes didn’t look so damn old and tired, he says, “What else can I do?” His violet gaze drops from your face to his hand on your chest. He picks at where the bandages are tied off at the wrist.

“Fight me. Yell at me. Curse me. Hate me.” You supply the words easily. This is all very obvious. It annoys you how oblivious he pretends to be about this.

“Can’t do those things,” that stupid little not-quite-a-smirk flicks across his lips again. You want to bite the expression off. You tug his hair instead. Kissing would be a detriment to your conversation now, that you were becoming more and more genuinely interested in.

“And why not?”

Eridan stills. Even his breath stops. You wish you had a hand to his throat to feel his heartbeat. His eyes close completely and he whispers, “I can’t.”

“That isn’t an answer!” Your own passion and volume surprises you. You jerk back and stare at him. He blinks back at you, startled. You let go of his hair and push yourself up into a sitting position for a little distance from him. “That’s not an answer and you know it.”

“Well it’s my answer.” He stays lying down, putting his uninjured hand behind his head to prop it up so his horns don’t dig into the mattress or pillow too badly.

“You’re impossible,” These words are easier to say when you’re not so tangled up with him, when you don’t see his face right in front of yours. “You come home to me fucking a guy and don’t even flip the fuck out. I know all about the highblood rages you trolls can get, Eridan. I’ve even seen you freak over shit, but all you do to this betrayal is break a fucking glass? Aren’t you supposed to flip black or something over this kind of infidelity?”

“I am not doing that. Hell fuckin’ no.”

You turn to glare at him. He shakes his head at you. That sad look is gone, replaced with a stubborn set to his jaw. “Excuse me?”

“I am not goin’ black for you, Dirk. And if that’s what you’re tryin’ to get me to do so you think you can have me and have him well let me just fuckin’ tell you this.” He sits up and leans in close to you. You feel a shiver run up your back, prickling goosebumps along your shoulders. He holds your gaze for a moment longer than you expect and then says, “I am ridin’ that black train all the way into Nopesville.”

You laugh. You don’t mean to, but you turn your head away and you chuckle at him. “Well too fucking bad! I’m the conductor of this train and we’re going where I say.”

“Lies,” he says off-handedly, leaning back out of your space. You instinctively relax. “I’m the mayor of Nopesville and I say we’re goin’ there and stayin’ there. That black train is getting dismantled at the station to turn to dust.”

“Fuck that, I’m the governor of Yes County-“

“I don’t think it works like that-”

“It does now! Anyway I’m the governor and what I says goes.” You interrupt his interrupt.

“Nope.” Eridan shakes his head, “I’ve just been elected President of Nopemerica and I declare all black trains to be painted red and raced into the sunset like a wildwest movie.”

“That’s ridiculous. You can’t cover up black painted trains with red paint so easily.”

“I can too.”

“You know what, President Eridan,” You say with a smirk, “I know exactly what your homestate is.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. Denial.”

He laughs at that, rubbing the heel of his hand at the tears in his eyes that comes with the laughter. “You caught me.” He’s smiling a smile you can’t resist, so you lean in without even thinking about it and kiss him.

Eridan goes still again. For a moment you just sit there, kissing him, without him kissing back, wondering if he really did hate you. Then he cups your face in his hand, the bandages a weird texture on your skin, and he kisses back fervently. You sling an arm across his shoulders, keeping him close even after the kiss is over, and you ask him, “Eridan, please, why don’t you hate me?”

He won’t look in your eyes for more than a second. He strokes your cheek with his fingertips and when the words come out, he’s breathless, like he struggled through a mire to fetch them for you. “Because I need you and love you more than I could ever hate you.” He swallows. You see tears drip down his cheeks and he finishes with, “Because I would do anything to keep you. Anything at all.”

Your whole world bottoms out.

It’s one thing to feel like you have complete control over someone, a heady feeling you frequently get because of Eridan’s behavior, but it was another thing altogether when he outright _said_ you had that control over him. Your head was swimming, the world spinning, and you dig your nails into his shoulder to ground yourself. It hardly helps at all. Sound is muffled by the rushing in your ears. Your fingers were tingling like they had fallen asleep.

“Dirk!”

Eridan’s voice cuts in and startles you. You suck in a painful breath and blink. He’s holding your face in his hands, one rough from bandages, and the other rough from his callouses. You shake off his hands and have to distance yourself from him. You lean back against the wall and close your eyes. There’s a clack sound and in your hand, Eridan places your glasses.

You slide them onto place and rest your head back against the wall. You look at him, through the tinted glass. He’s got his lower lip jutting out in that pout he does when he furrows his brows in worry. He doesn’t ask you if you’re okay or not. He’s waiting for a signal from you.

How do you reward someone for the best power rush you’ve ever felt in your life? A blowjob just doesn’t seem like it’ll cut it this time. No. It had to be something equally good, something equally thrilling for him.

A smirk crosses your lips.

You reach forward and gather his face in your hands. You smooth your thumbs over his cheeks, fan your fingertips over the ridges of his earfins, and draw him closer. When he’s close enough that you can see the flecks of amber around the outside of his irises, the very last signs of his youth, you whisper the four little words you know he needs from you.

“I’ll keep you, always.”


End file.
